SOLID CLUES: Quantum Physics, Molecular Biology and the Future of Science

by Gerald Feinberg ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1985

A generally intelligent, perceptive view of the future directions of science--colored by the author's perspectives as a particle physicist at Columbia, and reflecting discussions with such Columbia colleagues as I.I. Rabi and Ernest Nagel. The first two, longish chapters are state-of-the-art summaries of Feinberg's field, and of molecular biology: today's leading fields of science. Both point not only to current trends but to unsolved problems--such as the fate of the universe, cell differentiation and organ development. Feinberg is generally optimistic that new tools and techniques may provide answers and, in the case of biology, move it closer to physics in a mathematizing/molecular way. Computers may find approximate solutions to the unwieldy nonlinear equations theoreticians develop (or else the equations may themselves change, as has happened in physics). New fields may emerge, such as a science studying the development of order and complexity from the simple or disordered. Some questions, like weather prediction, may prove not to be solvable insofar as the parameters give rise to discontinuities or ""chaos."" The book's later sections deal with the politics and sociology of science, and specifically with threats from within and without. These range from increased competition as the number of Ph.Ds mounts and research funds shrink, to external or self-imposed constraints on what can be studied. (Feinberg quotes a colleague's remark that she would be forced to leave America if her research showed intelligence to be largely a matter of heredity.) He worries somewhat that fractionization within fields and scientists' habit of focusing on last week's preprint may blank out important unsolved problems of the past. As others have done, he speaks of the limits of science, the uncertainty principles, and the never-knowables--to which might be added the very element that flaws Feinberg's eminently logical approach: the chance discoveries that revolutionize a field. For readers with some scientific grounding (by contrast with Feinberg's earlier What Is the World Made Of?): a good addition to the ""metascience"" literature.

Pub Date: April 1, 1985

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1985

Categories: NONFICTION